Helen Keller wrote the following, explaining her beliefs on love and life.
“I believe that we can live on earth according to the teachings of Jesus, and that the greatest happiness will come to the world when man obeys His commandment that “ye love one another.”
I believe that every question between man and man is a religious question, and that every social wrong is a moral wrong.
I believe that we can live on earth according to the fulfillment of God’s will, and that when the will of God is done on earth as it is in heaven, every man will love his fellow men and act toward them as he desires they should act toward him. I believe that the welfare of each is bound up int he welfare of all.
I believe that life is given us so we may grow in love, and I believe that God is in me as the sun is in the color and fragrance of a flower – the Light in my darkness, the Voice in my silence.
I believe that only in broken gleams has the Sun of Truth yet shone upon men. I believe that love will finally establish the Kingdom of God on earth, and that the cornerstones of that Kingdom will be Liberty, Truth, Brotherhood and Service.
I believe that no good shall be lost, and that all man has willed or hoped or dreamed of good shall exist forever.
I believe in the immortality of the soul because I have within me immortal longings. I believe that the state we enter after death is wrought of our own motives, thoughts and deeds. I believe that in the life to come I shall have the sense I have not had here, and that my home there will be beautiful with color, music, and speech of flowers and faces I love.
Without this faith there would be little meaning in my life. I should be “a mere pillar of darkness in the dark.” Observers in the full enjoyment of their bodily senses pity me, but it is because they do not see the golden chamber in my life where I dwell delighted; for, dark as my path may seem to them, I carry a magic light in my heart. Faith, the spiritual strong searchlight, illumines the way, and although sinister doubts lurk in the shadow, I walk unafraid toward the Enchanted Wood where the foliage is always green, where joy abides, where nightingales nest and sing, and where life and death are one in the Presence of the Lord.”
Author: Helen Keller
Source: Dale Carnegie’s Scrapbook
Image: Emily Skolozynski, U.S. Army (CC BY 2.0)
